


Workflow Management

by manic_intent



Series: Reeve's Work/Life Balance [2]
Category: Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VII: Remake
Genre: M/M, Post-Canon, Spoilers for FF7:R, That Postgame fic where Reeve holds a work meeting at Rufus' house, and it turns out to be a date
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-22
Updated: 2020-04-22
Packaged: 2021-03-01 22:13:38
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,516
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23794429
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/manic_intent/pseuds/manic_intent
Summary: Reeve didn’t know what to expect when he’d shown up to his scheduled meeting with Rufus only to find the President’s office mostly empty. A pair of closemouthed Turks had hustled him aboard a helicopter, flying him off the ShinRa building despite Reeve’s murmured protests that he had work to do and would reschedule.“Where are we disposing of my body?” Reeve asked from the back of the helicopter over the roar of the blades.“You’re a funny guy for an egghead,” said the red-haired man in the co-pilot’s seat.
Relationships: Rufus Shinra/Reeve Tuesti
Series: Reeve's Work/Life Balance [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1714213
Comments: 27
Kudos: 142





	Workflow Management

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is really about Rufus’ FF7:R clothes. Full aesthetic, I guess. I love Final Fantasy games.

Reeve didn’t know what to expect when he’d shown up to his scheduled meeting with Rufus only to find the President’s office mostly empty. A pair of closemouthed Turks had hustled him aboard a helicopter, flying him off the ShinRa building despite Reeve’s murmured protests that he had work to do and would reschedule. 

“Where are we disposing of my body?” Reeve asked from the back of the helicopter over the roar of the blades. 

“You’re a funny guy for an egghead,” said the red-haired man in the co-pilot’s seat. The pilot grunted and said nothing, steering the helicopter over Midgar, a man-made constellation of stars. Reeve looked away from the view, twisting his fingers in his lap. The nightly light show made him ill nowadays. It reminded him of the cost—and of what ShinRa had already done to keep things this way. 

Reeve held his folder to his chest and bit down his retort. The helicopter landed on the unmarked roof of a tower, depositing Reeve on the concrete before taking off without any further ceremony. As the thunder of its rotor faded into the distance, Reeve looked around helplessly. The only way off the roof that he could see was through a fire escape to the side, between large vents and coolant fans. He picked his way over and tried the door. Unlocked. There wasn’t far to go—the fire escape went down just one floor to a closed steel door. Reeve flinched as blue lines of light flicked over his body. An ID scan? The door slid open, leaving Reeve gawking. 

He walked into a vast lawn of trimmed grass that stretched away to either side as far as he could see, speckled with white and yellow wildflowers. Reeve blinked, rubbing his eyes and breathing out shakily as he recognised the technology for what it was. ShinRA virtual reality, but without the need for a headset. Kneeling, Reeve ran his palm over the grass. Real, and he could smell the soil. Just the walls and ceiling were image tech, then. 

A low growl jerked Reeve to his feet. Rufus’ large military canine padded out of a gap in the wall, snorting loudly as it scented the air, Bright red eyes tracked him across a broad snout, the bony forehead crowned with large, tapering ears. The hairless creature looked sculpted out of muscle and claws and teeth, draped with heavy chains. Its sinuous tail lashed the air as it approached. 

Reeve backed away slowly, flinching as his shoulders hit the closed door. As he froze up, the dog closed in, huffing as it sniffed Reeve over, ears flicking back and forth. A visceral mental image of the giant dog tearing out Reeve’s throat flit across his mind and he closed his eyes, hunching down behind his folder and drawing in a thin breath.

“Darkstar likes you.” 

Reeve looked up cautiously. Rufus walked across the grass, coat and all, his lips curving into a smirk. Bastard. “I’m… not really a dog person,” Reeve said, tensing up as Darkstar huffed loudly. The dog loped over to his master, panting as Rufus tickled him behind his ears. Reeve cleared his throat, forcing himself to step away from the wall and project some confidence. “Is this a new ShinRa facility?”

“It’s my home,” Rufus said, beckoning as he loped back across the grass. “VR headsets are clunky. I’ve been integrating AR with existing holographic technology. I think Heidegger had some of my work built into Slug Rays so that my father could project himself over a grand scale for dramatic effect. Typical.” 

“I wasn’t aware. I’ve never seen you on the tech floors. Even before…” Reeve trailed off, clearing his throat. He still didn’t know the circumstances behind Rufus’ abrupt disappearance. Rufus had been young then, still a teen. 

“I’d have been surprised if you had.” The gap in the seamless screen opened into something more familiar: a small lab, workbenches buried under unfinished devices and tools. A computer wedged against cases of servers ran a program across three of its six screens. Darkstar padded over to a large dog bed under a workbench, curling up on it with a snort. Coins floated in a pale solution within a tube, linked up to a larger tube containing materia in different colours. 

“Am I disturbing you?” Reeve asked out of habit, even though this was a scheduled meeting. 

“You, disturb me? Never.” Rufus set his hand on the small of Reeve’s back and chivvied him through the lab. “I was finishing up anyway.”

“Why build a private lab out here?” Reeve asked as they walked through into a living space that was smaller than Reeve’s flat, if furnished with elegant steel and glass pieces over a mahogany floor. Large paintings in ornate frames broke up the plain white wall—no, not paintings. More hyperreal screens. A replica Impressionist painting flickered, turning into a highly realistic view of a tropical fish tank. 

“Not my choice. Not at first. Now, I find it restful. Fewer interruptions.” Rufus unbuttoned his overcoat, hanging it on a rack that held his gunbelts and holsters. 

He wore a black dress shirt and tie under the overcoat and a billowing pair of unbuttoned riding pants over _another_ set of pants tucked into leather boots, his waist hung with linked belts that formed a loose cage by his knees. Even for a young man who was now one of the wealthiest people in the world, it was an unnecessarily complicated sartorial choice. Reeve tried not to stare as Rufus sat on a bench and pulled off the boots, averting his eyes and toeing off his shoes as Rufus tilted his head in a silent query. 

“Drink?” Rufus asked as he waved Reeve to one of the sleek leather-cushioned high stools lined up by the kitchen counter. 

“Not while I’m working.” 

“Wine, then.” Rufus flashed Reeve a handsome smile as he walked over to a wine fridge in the corner of the kitchen. “Since we’re at my home.” 

“Do you dress up for all your visitors?” Reeve asked as Rufus selected wine glasses from a cabinet and picked a bottle from the fridge. 

“Only the ones I like.” Rufus poured for them both, a deep, vibrant red. Reeve tried not to pull a face: he didn’t much enjoy wines, especially full-bodied reds, and not on an empty stomach. Reeve took a sniff, swirled, and sipped anyway, to be polite.

“Someone trained you,” Rufus said, amused. 

“I’m an executive board member of one of the biggest companies in the world,” Reeve said, frowning at Rufus. “I learned.” 

“I doubt Heidegger did.” Rufus didn’t bother with ritual—he drank, his throat working. 

Reeve didn’t want to talk about Heidegger—it usually gave him a headache. He set his folder down pointedly on the counter, but Rufus ignored the hint. Clearing his throat, Reeve tried casting about for a polite line of small talk but ended up saying, “Were you here all this while? I mean. Before you returned to ShinRa.” 

“No. My father sent me further away. I lived here when I was a boy. It did have to be refurbished before my return, with my current projects moved here.” Rufus looked out of the window at the sea of dotted lights, the wineglass pressed against his lips. 

“Sent away on some top-secret mission for ShinRa,” Reeve said, recalling the official story. 

Rufus smirked at him over the glass rim. “You don’t believe that, do you? Enough about me. Dinner. Do you have allergies or dietary requirements?”

“I’m not hungry, sir.”

“It wasn’t a request.” Rufus stared evenly at Reeve.

Reeve hated that he was the first to look away. “No. No allergies.” 

“Good.” Rufus pulled out a phone. 

“Surely you could find better company elsewhere,” Reeve said, shifting uneasily on his seat as Rufus sat down beside him. 

Rufus hadn’t done much more than flirt now and then since their last… encounter… and Reeve hadn’t been sure what to think about it. Things between them were mostly professional, and the working relationship he had with Rufus was far better than the one he’d had with Rufus’ father. He’d put it down to Rufus having satisfied his curiosity and moved on, but now he wasn’t sure. Worse, Reeve didn’t know what to think. He couldn’t deny his attraction to the handsome young man, ill-advised as it was. 

“I could,” Rufus said, tapping out a message before pocketing the phone. He pulled over the folder, opening it and flicking through the pages. Rufus’ father used to insist on printouts for everything, even elaborate graphs. Strange that Rufus hadn’t called for a paperless process. “What’s this?” Rufus stabbed his finger at a page in a flourish. 

Or maybe he liked the melodrama that paper allowed. “A secret laboratory found under the sector during renovations. An old ShinRa facility, we believe, infested with monsters,” Reeve said. 

Rufus turned a page and raised his eyebrows at the glossy photographs of the dead creature that Hojo had called ‘Behemoth Type-0’. “ShinRa experiments?” 

“Hojo claims it was before his time.”

“Of course he does.” Rufus’ mouth twisted in distaste. “I hate that man.” 

“Isn’t Darkstar his work?” 

“It doesn’t make his attitude any easier to take.” Rufus shuddered, then glanced at Reeve. “Don’t tell me you like him.”

“No! Not at all. Can’t you have him removed? The things he does are hardly ethical by any measure. I’m fairly sure that he was torturing the Ancients he had in his custody. Some of the experiments with the creature he called Jenova—”

Rufus held up a hand. “Distasteful as he is, he’s currently necessary. The moment he isn’t, he’ll find out.” Darkstar rumbled from the lab, as though in agreement. 

“How can anything he does be necessary?” 

“Didn’t you see the strange wraiths? Or the footage of what happened to my father? Who but Hojo could explain all that?” 

Reeve stiffened and stared at his hands. Everyone had seen it during an emergency executive meeting: the impossibility who had appeared, the brutal way the President had died. Rufus had stayed silent through the video, his cheek pressed against his knuckles. Scarlet had been shocked, Heidegger outraged, Palmer frightened. Only Hojo had leaned forward in delight. 

“I didn’t think it was possible,” Reeve said at last. “For someone to come back from the dead—”

Rufus made a dismissive gesture. He started to say more and hesitated as a bell chimed through the apartment. Dinner was served on trays by silent people in suits, arranging the dishes on the counter before retreating just as quietly as they arrived. Flatbread toasted golden on a plate, drizzled with olive oil and with a smear of butter or cheese beside it. Two servings of pasta in a creamy sauce, curls of casarecce looped around thumbs of broken-up sausages and dusted with cheese and sage. Nothing showy or elaborate. 

Reeve’s surprise must have been evident—Rufus smiled sharply but said nothing, continuing to read as he picked up a piece of bread and ate. Intending to eat only as much as he needed to be polite, Reeve selected a piece and bit down. 

He stifled a groan. The garlicky crust broke buttery and light in Reeve’s mouth, a snapshot of sunlight. The dip turned out to be whipped curd cheese with a touch of nut and pepper, providing a luxurious coda to each bite of bread. The twists of perfectly cooked pasta graced beautifully spiced sausage and a surprisingly subtle sauce. It was the best meal that he had ever eaten. 

“I appreciate quality,” Rufus said as silent staff cleared the dishes, leaving a bowl of assorted fresh berries. 

“I see that,” Reeve said. “Thank you for dinner. It was excellent.” 

Rufus hummed, his gaze raking slowly down Reeve’s face as he popped a blackberry into his mouth. “We aren’t done yet.”

Reeve began to ask about dessert and gasped as Rufus leaned over and kissed him, the tart berry bursting between their tongues. Rufus licked into Reeve’s mouth, chasing the taste, lapping up the juice that stained Reeve’s lips. Rufus made a low and strangled sound of hunger. He kissed sweet plump blueberries between them, bites of ripe strawberries, of sour raspberries that smeared their lips a silky red. Reeve moaned as he clumsily ate it up and pushed for more: more of Rufus’ touch, his taste, his attention. 

“Sir,” Reeve whispered a dazed protest as Rufus pulled away, eating him up with his eyes. “I… we shouldn’t do this.” 

“Why not?” Rufus asked, catching Reeve’s bearded chin with his thumb and forefinger, licking a stripe over Reeve’s mouth as Reeve started to speak, up to his nose. “I should fuck you here,” Rufus hissed. “Up on the counter, over your endless damned notes and graphs and charts.” 

Reeve flushed, arousal pooling heavily in his gut, though what he said was, “If you wanted a digital copy instead—”

Rufus let out a sharp laugh, jerking back, the violent edge of his hunger bleeding into amusement. Reeve sensed the malice in that sentiment, in the bright flash of Rufus’ teeth before he leaned back in for a lingering kiss. Entwining his fingers in Reeve’s tie, Rufus led them away from the kitchen and into an adjoining bedroom.

“You’re my boss,” Reeve said, trying a final protest as Rufus pushed him down on the large bed. 

“And?” Rufus asked, pulling Reeve’s jacket off his shoulders and tossing it off the bed. He pinned Reeve to the bed, twisting Reeve’s tie up in one clenched fist, kissing the crushed silk. “Doesn’t that mean that you’re mine to command?”

 _I own you_ , Rufus had told Cloud on the roof, arrogant and self-assured. It’d been somewhat cathartic watching Cloud defeat Rufus, at least at first. Somewhere along the line, dealing with Rufus had moved from being unsettling and borderline unwanted into something far less definable. Stockholm syndrome, maybe. Whatever it was, Reeve let out a shaky laugh and lay back on the bed, allowing Rufus to unbutton his shirt. He tried to work out the morass of clips and buckles on Rufus’ belt and found a hidden clasp that eased them all off Rufus’ narrow hips.

As Rufus tugged off their ties, Reeve asked, “Why do you wear two pairs of pants?” 

Rufus shot him a look. “Is that the sole burning question on your mind right now?”

“I just don’t…” Reeve gestured helplessly at Rufus’ clothes. “Is it a new fashion? Do you find Midgar cold?”

“You wear the same set of clothes every day, you’re hardly in a place to offer any criticism,” Rufus said. Under his shirt, Rufus was lean and sleekly packed with muscle, an athlete in the prime of his life. “Do you have several copies of the same suit? Even the same tie?” 

“What?” Reeve asked, distracted as he watched muscle bunch and flex under velvety skin. 

How did Rufus get the scars that he wore? Surely the son of one of the wealthiest men in the world would’ve led a coddled life. Reeve ran his fingers curiously over a pale scar high on Rufus’ flank. Rufus smiled. He kissed down Reeve’s throat, working in playful bites over his collarbone, down his chest. 

Reeve squirmed, self-conscious as his shirt, belt, and pants joined his jacket on the floor. His body didn’t have the muscle tone that Rufus’ did—hell, the only tone it had was a sun-deficient pale, worn close to the bone from too many late nights picking at ShinRa canteen food. Reeve waited for disappointment or malice, either in any measure. Rufus didn’t appear to care, leaning up to kiss Reeve with just as much hunger as before even as he pushed a spit-slicked hand into Reeve’s underwear to grasp him, stroking him into breathless arousal.

“Sir,” Reeve gasped as they kissed, “ _please_.” 

“Better and better,” Rufus whispered, stripping off the last of their clothes with impatient tugs. As Rufus leaned over to search through a side drawer, Reeve sneaked a glance down. His mouth went dry. Tucked against Reeve’s thigh, Rufus’ cock thickened into a long and heavy shaft, a little curved. “Like what you see?” Rufus asked, nipping at Reeve’s ear. “You’ll be taking it tonight.” 

“I don’t… it’s been a while,” Reeve said, nervous. 

“I could guess. Potions tend to simplify things.” Rufus gave Reeve’s cock one last squeeze. “Turn around. Don’t worry; I’ll be gentle. For now.” 

Reeve wasn’t sure if he liked the sound of that, but he obeyed, twisting onto his front. Rufus pulled a pillow under Reeve’s hips and opened a vial. The cool liquid eased the pain from the stretch of Rufus’ fingers into a dull discomfort, then a pleasant fullness as Rufus gently worked him open. Reeve found himself moaning with greater and greater urgency as Rufus fit in a third finger, hands clenched on the sheets. Rufus watched him with a possessive smile, so very smug as he crooked his fingers and rubbed teasingly against a spot in Reeve that made him shout. 

“Beg me again,” Rufus ordered, his breath hot against the back of Reeve’s neck. 

“Please,” Reeve said, grinding his hips helplessly into the pillow. 

“You can do better than that,” Rufus said, nipping him hard on the shoulder in reproach. “Again.” 

“Please… please, sir.” Reeve’s voice hitched desperately as Rufus thrust in his fingers to the knuckles, just shy of the right spot. “More. Please.”

“That’s a little better, but not by much.” Rufus’s fingers slipped out of Reeve with a wet sound as he pulled on a condom and used the rest of the potion to slick himself up. “Go on.” 

“Sir… i-inside me. Please,” Reeve begged, his nerves too shredded for pride. “I need more.” 

“A work in progress, I think.” The blunt head of Rufus’ cock nudged up teasingly against Reeve’s opening, pressing in as Reeve squirmed and arched. 

Even with the potion, the stretch punched the air out of Reeve’s lungs, leaving him keening thinly as Rufus pushed deeper. It didn’t hurt, but it wasn’t pleasurable the way Reeve used to understand pleasure. The feel of Rufus within him, of his teeth against Reeve’s throat, his hoarse and cruel laughter hot against his cheek—it was overwhelming. Ruinous. Reeve dragged a pillow over and buried his face in it to gag the wounded cries that threatened to tear free from him as Rufus settled flush against his ass, as Rufus kissed his cheek and circled long fingers with mock tenderness around his throat. 

“Don’t. I want to hear you,” Rufus said, shifting against Reeve without giving him time to adjust. As Reeve stifled his cry into the pillow, Rufus clenched his hand into Reeve’s hair. “One more time and I’ll put Darkstar’s spare collar on you.” 

Reeve pushed the pillow away, panting. He wailed as Rufus thrust against him, hard enough that he could feel it in his spine. “Slow… slower!” 

“You don’t have the right to command me, Reeve.” Rufus nipped him hard on his shoulder, close to the earlier bite. “But I’ll allow you to beg. Again.”

“Please, sir. Slow… slow down. _Please_.” 

They settled into a slow but punishing rhythm. Reeve’s moans grew louder, higher, desperate with need as Rufus drove into him. Rufus’s breathing deepened and turned uneven, the only outward sign of his pleasure as he held Reeve down with a hand clenched into Reeve’s shoulder and the other balanced on the sheets. He was relentless. 

“I’ll tell you a secret,” Rufus said as Reeve began to lose track of time, his hand squeezing a little tighter as he moved. “Darkstar and I share a bioengineered bond. Enhanced empathy, that’s what the lab was calling it.” 

Rufus wanted to talk about his dog? Now? Reeve twisted against the sheets to stare incredulously up at Rufus. “W-what?”

“It’s why we work together as well as we do.” Rufus nuzzled Reeve’s bearded cheek. “He can anticipate my commands. Feel what I feel.”

Was Rufus implying…? Reeve looked around wildly, but he couldn’t see the dog. “You’re not serious,” Reeve panted. 

“Aren’t I?” Rufus briefly caught Reeve’s ear in his teeth as he thrust. “You’re so tight… if he were to mount you like this, would you take him as well as you’re taking me?” 

“I…!” To Reeve’s astonished horror, release hit him with a jolt of ecstasy, shaking him apart as Rufus laughed and didn’t even stop, riding him through the aftershocks. As Reeve sank into the bed, he gasped, “You’re… that’s sick.” 

“Says the one who made a mess,” Rufus said, swiping his hand under Reeve and making him hiss as he gripped Reeve’s oversensitive cock. “Be still. I’m not done with you yet, and we’ve got all the time in the world.”

#

“By the way, why do you feel the need to print everything out?” Rufus asked over breakfast. “It’s a waste of paper. Is it an older person thing?”

Reeve choked on his coffee and had to be slapped on the back as he coughed.

**Author's Note:**

> twitter: @manic_intent  
> prompt policy: manic-intent.tumblr.com  
> \--  
> Refs:  
> I’ve never tried cooking the recipes myself, but they’re from two great restaurants in Melbourne: Marion (the flatbread is complimentary, and lol. It is better than the actual food on the menu tbh), and Tipo00, which IMO is at least as good as the pasta I’ve tried in Italy.  
> Flatbread recipe: https://www.delicious.com.au/recipes/garlic-flatbread-whipped-curd-cheese/543vm4fh  
> Casarecce recipe: https://www.gourmettraveller.com.au/recipes/chefs-recipes/casarecce-with-pork-and-fennel-sausage-ragu-8410
> 
> Pants on top of pants: from an extensive twitter discussion: https://twitter.com/manic_intent/status/1252793267780894720 Thanks everyone for the help LOL.


End file.
